Ferrari vow to investigate Monaco GP strategy errors

Ferrari says it will hold an internal investigation to find a “clear explanation” as to how it managed to throw away victory in Formula 1’s Monaco Grand Prix.

The Italian outfit had been running 1-2 in the early stages only for its race to unravel into a series of mistakes that ultimately cost it a win.

It didn’t react to Red Bull’s call to switch its drivers on to the intermediate tyres quick enough, allowing Sergio Perez to undercut polesitter Charles Leclerc.

Leclerc’s race was hampered further when a miscommunication meant he pitted on the same lap as team-mate Carlos Sainz, losing him crucial time and dropping him to fourth place.

Both Ferrari drivers would end up finishing second and fourth respectively, with Sainz unable to find a way past eventual winner Perez, while Leclerc was frustrated to finish off the podium.

The Monegasque felt the team had made “too many mistakes” that cannot be afforded when fighting for the world championship.

Team principal Mattia Binotto accepted errors had played a major part in its Monaco defeat and stressed it was important that Ferrari understood where it went wrong.

“I think we need to admit that if you’re leading the race, and you’re finding yourself in first position, then we may have done something wrong,” Binotto said, as quoted by Motorsport.com. “So we made certainly mistakes in our judgement and we made mistakes in our calls.

“Now, what’s the process which brought us to make mistakes? I think the first mistake was underestimating the pace of the intermediate and the gap we had to the other cars, in terms of track position.”

He added: “I think we made a mistake as well, because we should have called him earlier, at least a lap earlier, or if not, as we did, we should have